


Just Two

by fields_of_falafel



Series: The Misadventures of the Modern Hams [10]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: a few schuyler brothers make an appearance, but mostly just sister fluff and bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-10
Updated: 2017-01-10
Packaged: 2018-09-16 13:23:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9273677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fields_of_falafel/pseuds/fields_of_falafel
Summary: Eliza moved back into the Schuyler mansion and all seems to be normal until a surprise visitor appears.





	

**Author's Note:**

> just as a reference in this fic:  
> Angelica: 24  
> Eliza: 23  
> Peggy: 22  
> John Bradstreet: 15  
> Philip Jeremiah: 12  
> Rensselaer: 7  
> Cornelius: 4  
> Philip Schuyler Church: 2

She’d forgotten how much she’d missed home.

Living with Gertrude had been a nice reprieve from her usual helter-skelter New York life, or, really,  _ more _ than a nice reprieve, but she was more than happy to be back in New York. 

“Good morning!” Eliza beamed, grabbing a piece of toast off a plate and kissing her mother’s cheek. 

Eliza’s mother, Catherine, was a tall and elegant woman, who even after having seven kids (and pregnant with an eighth!) looked like a woman who could be hit by a hurricane and emerge with not a hair out of place. 

“Morning hon,” her mother responded with a brief smile as she picked up four-year-old Cornelius. “Have you got any plans to go out today?”

Eliza shook her head, picking up an empty coffee mug, “I’d thought about applying for one of the volunteer jobs today, y’know, for the war effort, but I think I might stay in instead.”

Her mother hummed. “It’d be good for you, I’m sure, but I need you here today besides.”

“What for?” Eliza raised an eyebrow and poured the hot coffee into her mug.

“An important guest is arriving soon, and I need you and your brothers to help me clean.” She gestured around the immaculate kitchen, as if it needed to be cleaned.

Eliza rolled her eyes, but nodded obediently. “The boys need to be woken up first.”

“They’ll sleep all day if you let them. Go on, then, I need this place spotless as soon as possible.”

Eliza picked up her steaming hot coffee mug and made her way up the stairs to the boys’ rooms. John Bradstreet, or just JB, was the oldest and had turned his brand new room (that he didn’t have to share) into a dark cesspool filled to the brim with the stench of teenage boy.

Eliza, being the cruel sister that she was, gently woke her brother up with a push. Once he groaned loud enough she knew he was awake.

“Morning, sunshine.” She grinned, taking a sip from her coffee as she watched her fifteen-year-old brother struggle to get out of bed.

“Go away.” He mumbled, dragging the blanket over his head.

“Mama’s cooking breakfast.” And with just those three words JB was out of bed and rushing downstairs. Eliza smiled. One down, two to go.

Her other two brothers, Jerry and Ren (short for Philip Jeremiah and Rensselaer) shared a room down the hall. They were five years apart so obviously, as brothers did, they hated each other. Twelve-year-old neat bookworm Jerry hated (with a passion) seven-year-old messy, sports-loving Ren. Why her mother thought putting those two in the same room would work was beyond her. 

“Alright, boys, time to get up.” Eliza walked in, flicking the light switch on and off a few times. Jerry groaned, but got himself up, grabbing his glasses off of his nightstand. Ren stayed firmly underneath his sheets, sound asleep. 

“Come on, kiddo, it’s breakfast time.” Eliza walked over, doing her best to get him up. Jerry was already on his way down the stairs, running a hand through his messy hair, but her seven-year-old brother was a completely different story. It took Eliza quite literally dragging the kid out of bed and onto the floor for him to even begin to think about getting out of bed. 

Last, but certainly not least was Peggy. She considered trying to take on the gargantuan task of getting her little sister out of bed, but decided to pass. She was making her way downstairs, coffee cup almost empty, and heard from the stairs a lot of noise coming from the floor below.

Fearing the worst she rushed down the stairs, her heart beating faster. What could possibly be making all that commotion? When she rounded the corner into the kitchen, her heart stopped beating altogether.

“Angelica!” Her face widened, taking in the sight of the sister she hadn’t seen in over a year. Barely taking the time to set her coffee cup aside she leapt into her sister’s arms, laughing all the while.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming here?” She scolded, playing slapping her sister on the arm.

Angelica smiled. “I wanted to surprise you. And I’ve brought someone I’m sure you’re quite anxious to meet.”

Eliza glanced around, knowing at once who Angelica meant. And sure enough, there he was - her little nephew, playing in his grandmother’s arms. 

“Oh my God, he’s so big!” Eliza laughed, taking the toddler into her arms. 

“Little Phil is quite the handful.” Angelica smiled at her son.

“Just wait until you have eight.” Their mother told the two. “That’s a handful.”

“I don’t think I’ll have quite that many.” Angelica gave a pointed look.

Catherine waved a hand casually. “That’s what I said.” She grinned, taking the baby from Eliza and walking away.

Angelica linked arms with her younger sister and grabbed her suitcase, giving her sister a wink. “Let’s get upstairs, hmm? We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

Eliza grinned, so overcome by happiness that she wasn’t sure what else to do but follow her up the stairs.

Fifteen minutes later Angelica was unpacked and sitting in what used to be their shared room, but now was only Eliza’s, facing one another on the bed. 

“Okay, honestly, tell me what you’re doing over here. And don’t tell me it’s because you wanted to surprise me.” Though she knew her older sister would cross an ocean just to come say hi, she was certain it wasn’t the only reason she was here.

Angelica smiled cheekily. “Are you saying that my love for you isn’t enough to come to America?”

Eliza grinned shyly. “I know you better than that. What are you  _ really _ doing here?”

Angelica rolled her eyes. “Okay, you got me. I just came from New York City, because I was visiting a friend there. We had a lot of important . . . well, I guess you can call it information, that we needed to share.”

“I guess you aren’t going to tell me the details of that information?” Eliza raised an eyebrow.

She laughed. “Definitely not.” She shook her head. “Enough about me, tell me what you’ve been up to. I heard you lived with Aunt Gertrude for a little while?”

Eliza groaned. “I know I shouldn’t hate, and I don’t, but good  _ God _ that woman drives me up the  _ wall _ !”

Angelica laughed. “Why do you think she’s not invited to Thanksgiving and Christmas?”

“I never knew, I swear.”

“Oh, but it couldn’t have been  _ all _ bad.” Angelica meant it as a slight jab, but Eliza just thought of her boys.

“No,” she said dreamily, “it wasn’t all bad.”

This piqued her interest. Angelica had never seen her sister like this, except for one time in the tenth grade when she had her first kiss. But this was much, much worse.

“Eliza . . .”

“Hmm?”

“Did you meet someone in Morristown?”

Eliza looked shocked. “How’d you guess? You haven’t been reading my letters, have you?”

Angelica’s eyes widened. Her little sister was in a relationship and didn’t tell her? And he wrote her  _ letters _ ? What was this, the eighteenth century? “He writes you letters?”

Eliza grinned a little coyly. “Well . . .” she said, pausing for effect, “one of them does.”

“ _ One of them _ ?”

Eliza laughed.

“How many are there, Eliza?” Her little sister . . . she never would have guessed she’d be dating multiple men!

She grinned. “Just two.”

“Just two?!”

“Yep.”

“‘Liza, it’s not right to lead two guys on like this,”

“Oh, what? No! That’s not what I’m doing.”

“Then how would you explain dating two guys at once?”

“We’re all dating each other! Polyamory, you know?”

Angelica smiled, very shocked. “I never would’ve guessed that my sister,  _ my _ little sister would have two boyfriends.”

“Oh, they’re not my boyfriends.” Eliza corrected, much to her sister’s confusion.

“Wait, then, what are they?”

“They’re my fiances.” The room was quiet for a long moment, until she said, “Angelica, close your mouth before a fly floats in.”

She shook her head, but closed her mouth. “I never would’ve guessed. Do Mama and Papa know yet?”

“No.” Eliza bit her lip. “Alexander is going to ask for Papa’s blessing as soon as he’s able to come up here.”

“Alexander? Sounds a little pretentious.”

Eliza laughed, thinking of him. “He is, just a little. John balances him out, though.”

“Alexander and John. They sound like nice boys.”

“Oh, they’re wonderful!” Eliza gushed. “And I love them so much.”

“Don’t you think you’re moving just a little too fast?” She asked. She’d rushed into her own marriage three years ago and there had been a couple of times that she’d regretted it, mostly all before Phil was born.

Her little sister just shrugged, however. “Maybe. But, Angelica, you don’t understand! I’ve never felt this way about anyone ever! I don’t know what I would do if they weren’t in my life.”

Angelica smiled. She’d been like this once, full of nothing but love for her own John, but after the honeymoon phase they had just been left with each other. It worked out okay between the two of them, though. “Just let them know that if they ever hurt you they’ll have me to deal with.”

She smiled. “I’ve told them a few stories and I think they’re already terrified.”

“Good. I have a reputation to keep up.”

“Speaking of your reputation, that British man you married can’t be doing that any favors in the revolutionary circles.”

“You’d be surprised, actually.” Angelica hmmed, but said no more on the subject. 

“How are you and John, by the way? I haven’t seen him since after you two eloped.”

“He’s off in London, doing his job. Actually, since you told me about John and Alexander, I have a little something to tell you.”

Eliza leaned forward, excited. It wasn’t often she found out her older sister’s secrets. She took a deep breath before replying. “John and I are actually in more of an . . . open relationship.”

“An open relationship?” She was confused.

“Yes,” Angelica nodded. “We have an arrangement where, publicly, it seems like we have a normal marriage but we privately get to be with whoever we want.”

She could see the wheels turning in her little sister’s brain. “So you sleep with other people? Besides your husband?”

She nodded. 

“Wait, so does that mean . . . is Philip John’s child?”

“What? Oh, yes, of course. When I sleep with others I usually prefer . . . well, women, to be blunt.”

“Huh.” Eliza commented. In truth, she wasn’t overly surprised. She’d always suspected that Angelica’s marriage wasn’t quite a normal one, just in the way husband and wife acted around each other. But she hadn’t guessed (for the most part) that Angelica was interested in the same sex.

But before Elia could ask any more questions Angelica was saying, “Enough about me, tell me about your Alexander and your John.”

Eliza, with a wide smile on her face, delightfully told the story of how she’d met the two, with Angelica giving her own commentary from time to time. 

“I’d definitely like to meet them.” She said when Eliza finished. 

“Alexander said he might be able to come up here in July . . . but I don’t think John will be able to until the holidays, or maybe even after.”

“Well,” Angelica said with just a hint of suggestiveness, “I may be able to convince Washington that he doesn’t need his aides for a week or two. I’ll be staying in America for most of the rest of the year if I’m lucky, so I’m sure I’ll get to meet them. I’ve just gotta make a few phone calls.”

As her sister departed the room to make her calls Eliza found herself feeling awfully grateful that she had such a connected and understanding sister.

A moment later Eliza heard Angelica walk back into the room but when she turned around to greet her she found that it was a very sleepy Peggy instead. 

“Is Angelica home or am I sleepwalking?” Peggy asked, looking half-asleep.

“Yep, Annie’s home for the time being.”

“Hmm.” Peggy nodded, eyes mostly closed. “Did I miss breakfast?”

Eliza laughed. “Mama might have a few scraps left for you if you hurry.”

Peggy nodded and started walking, or rather, zombie-walking, towards the kitchen, leaving Eliza to laugh behind her. 

**Author's Note:**

> i know it's been a really long time since i updated this series and i'd like to say sorry (i was in my school musical and i was working and i'm taking two ap classes my semester was a mess rip lmao) but i'm back now with hopefully more regular updates!
> 
> also i hoped you guys liked i've been sitting on this for a really long time lmao pls leave kudos or maybe even a comment (maybe?) if you enjoyed


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